


As Ice

by wanderingalonelypath



Category: RWBY
Genre: Character Study, F/F, Jacques is a piece of shit but what else is new, Weiss is gay, Whitley mention, growing up fic?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-23
Updated: 2018-04-23
Packaged: 2019-04-27 01:01:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 730
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14414259
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wanderingalonelypath/pseuds/wanderingalonelypath
Summary: Weiss Schnee was born into perfection, expected to excellence, and trained to be sensational. Her life was planned out to be flawless. She was born to be a robotic success. But may flowers always smell better than floor polish.And May was better than both.





	As Ice

Weiss Schnee was born into perfection.

Crystal glass and marble floors were as constant and blank as her family. Always dressed in stark white or dark blue. Always walking straight, as if held by puppet strings, polished shoes clicking on polished floors, minute scuffs that servants would scrub away later.

She was born into elegance. Excellence. No room for error or deviance.

Her mother, it seemed, was a thread that had frayed from the tapestry. With the birth of her last child, she seemed to lose a bit of herself. She sequestered herself in her private wing of the manor. Weiss used to tell herself that her mom was just playing princess, waiting for a prince to rescue her from her tower.

Weiss knew her father was no prince.

Winter had no time to play big sister. Her hair was tied as tight as her jawline, always clenched, brow always furrowed. Weiss could hear from her bedroom, some nights, when Winter would stay out late in the gardens to practice fighting. Sometimes she watched, peeking around her gauze curtains, as Winter stabbed and slashed at enemies that Weiss couldn’t see.

Winter always looked like she was fighting a war that no one else could know.

The first time her father hits her she is 9 years old. He just recently discovered her talent for singing and had immediately hired a voice tutor. She heard him in the hallways, expounding on how he would have her perform at charity events and galas, how his clients would simply adore her (talent). It was the first time Weiss ever felt like he was proud of her. 

She tried hard in her voice lessons, but for some reason, she couldn’t hit the high note of the balled she was to perform in 3 weeks. Her father stood next to her tutor, watching as she failed over and over again. Eventually, he dismisses the tutor and tells her to do it again. When she inevitably fails, he slaps her, cleanly, grabbing her shoulder in a vice so she doesn’t fall. She was so shocked that she didn’t cry, just ghosted her fingers across the mark as her father commanded “Again.”

She didn’t make many mistakes after that.

Weiss is thirteen when she meets her. Daughter of the cook sent to scurry on errands throughout the gardens Weiss liked to practice in. Winter left last fall and crafted a rapier for Weiss as a parting gift. Or an apology. It didn’t matter to her. Weiss wanted to fight, to scream, and sweat, to do anything that disrupted the linear trudge her life was becoming. Maybe that was why she actually responded when a kitchen girl, covered in flour, criticized her form.

Weiss soon found her time in the gardens doubling, gladly staying up late to talk with the kitchen girl. Her name was May, and she disrupted Weiss’ very nervous system. May could talk forever about her hometown, a village in Vale, and how she and her mother came to work here. Weiss always felt guilty about making May stay up so late when she had to wake so early to start breakfast. May always told her that she didn’t mind, that Weiss was worth it. So they talked as the moon arced across the sky, nestled between bushes of Villa Flowers, which were also May’s favorite.

That was where they kissed for the first time. Weiss leaned close to tuck a magenta blossom behind her ear, and May closed the distance. It was the first time either of them had kissed anyone, but Weiss didn’t mind the awkwardness when May cradled her face like she was precious, worthy. May was the only one who made her feel worthy.

It didn’t last long. Father found out, of course he did. She suspected it was Whitley, whose window was a story above their little hideaway. The next day there was a new cook in the kitchen, and Weiss found a note hidden in the briars of the flower bush. “Don’t freeze,” it said.

Meaningless words when she was locked in the Arctic, no chance of escaping like Winter did, no motivation to try.

So she sheathed her sword, donned the ivory mask, and fell in line. If she kept her ponytail to the side, it was a remnant of May. 

She was ice, but inside she burned

**Author's Note:**

> Weiss is my favorite character and she is so GAY, and I like to think she figured it out early on.


End file.
